In: Alpha Flight
In: Alpha Flight
Separated from her twin brother at a very young age, Jeanne grew up in a strict religious boarding school where her mutation was constantly put to the test.
The trauma caused by prejudice and persecution shaped the young woman’s mind into an unstable and fragmented state. Working alongside Department H may be the only thing that enables her to overcome her past and find hope for the future.
A young Canadian couple was surprised to give birth to twins; the pregnancy had come as a surprise to both of them, and they weren’t sure if they would be able to raise the children, as they lacked the financial means to do so.
So, they drove to a remote location and parked their car in the middle of a railroad track, awaiting certain death.
The couple did not survive the crash, just as they had planned, but the babies did. They were found by the police a few meters from the accident, as if they had been carried there. They were quiet and healthy, and were holding each other’s hands as if they couldn’t let go.
The twins were separated, and they wouldn’t even discover each other’s existence until early adulthood. Jeanne-Marie was sent to Madame Dupont’s School for Girls, a Christian girls’ boarding school run by nuns who believed in a strict curriculum and placed etiquette above all else.
Jeanne’s childhood was fairly ordinary, though lonely; she was one of the most determined students in her class and one of the most beloved by her peers, but everything changed with the onset of adolescence.
Her body was undergoing drastic changes due to puberty, with pointed ears forming and shiny, whitish strands appearing in her long hair. When no one was looking, the girl truly felt she could float; as she gazed up at the sky, her feet easily lifted off the ground.
When she began to reveal her abilities by performing tricks for a few of her closest friends, some of them became frightened and told the deputy head of the institution, Sister Anne.
From that point on, true hell began in the girl’s life.
Simply because of her unusual nature, the way Jeanne was treated by the tutors there changed completely. Her study and work schedules became strict, and she began receiving private lessons in etiquette and behavior.
They disliked the way the girl behaved, her unruly hair, her hoarse voice, her knees splayed when she sat, her crossed arms, and how much she observed and envied the other girls. Blasphemy.
Sister Anne claimed that change begins on the outside, and so she ordered that her ears be mutilated, with the tips torn off and reshaped into a more conventional form.
Her hair also had to be tended to every day, as she sat on the nuns’ laps so they could pluck out every single gray strand they saw. What infuriated them was that the institution claimed women were not allowed to trim their body hair or cut their hair, which forced them to spend hours of their mornings with the young mutant.
Mutant. That word was never spoken in the hallways, and the only time Jeanne dared to say it aloud, upon reading it in the daily log written by Sister Anne, she was struck with a slap across the mouth that made her bite her tongue.
By: Mannybumble
(@_mannybumble_ on Instagram)
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Name: Jeanne-Marie Beaubier
Aliases: Aurora, Sister Beaubier
Affiliation: Alpha Flight
Pets:
Relatives: Jean-Paul Beaubier (Brother) Kyle Jinadu (Brother-in-Law)
Allies: Walter Langkowski, Narya, Eugene Judd, Elizabeth Twoyoungmen, James Hudson, Heather Hudson, Michael Twoyoungmen
Origin: Mutant
Living Status: Alive
Marital Status: Single
Identity: Secret
Occupation: Agent of Department H
Base of Operations: Canada
From then on, her mind was shaped; Jeanne-Marie became exactly the woman the nuns wanted her to be: kind, feminine, delicate, quiet, and obedient.
More than that, they made her one of their own, allowing her to join the faculty when she came of age, to teach science and astronomy, since the girl had always been fascinated by the stars.
But on the other hand, there was something more. When the light faded, her heart yearned to burst through the skies, flying across the country like a shooting star; this woman was called Aurora, and she was everything they had tried to suppress her entire life.
In her daily life, Aurora sometimes manifested herself as well—when she was alone, when she watched the birds and whistled along with them, when she wrote her poems, when she watered the plants and communed with them, when she wished for the other sisters in the convent, when they sneaked through the upper hallways to kiss one another behind the curtains.
They never managed to cure her, and she don’t even know if they’re capable of doing so, but it’s so much easier to make them believe they have.
One day, the convent was awakened in the early hours of the morning; some nuns even went to the school to make sure the girls had stayed in their dormitories, but Jeanne stayed behind to assist the more experienced nuns.
During her routine patrol, Sister Berth found a man who needed help; he was staggering through the forest, covered in blood from head to toe, wearing a colorful tactical uniform. He was short and muscular, and he fainted shortly after being found.
Berth brought him in for treatment, but Sister Anne wanted to return him to the forest; she believed she had seen that uniform—or something similar—once on television. They were Canadian government agents, registered mutants working for the nation. She claimed it was a government scheme to humanize diabolical and profane figures like those, rather than seeking to treat and rehabilitate them into society.
Most voted to help him, but they chained him to a stretcher for safety. As they tended to his wounds, running their hands over his hairy chest and muscular arms, Jeanne saw in her sisters’ eyes a desire, restrained and suppressed by guilt.
But as soon as they began treatment, they realized the wounds were gradually disappearing, as if healing at an abnormal speed. Frightened, they let Sister Anne take charge to perform an exorcism on that abnormal figure; that was when the man woke up, laughed, and easily broke free from the stretcher with claws that tore out of his wrists.
He continued walking half-naked out into the snow. But Jeanne stopped him as he passed the school’s facade; in her hands she held warm clothes and Sister Anne’s car keys, and she said she could take him far away from there. She claimed she was just like him.
The man introduced himself as Logan; he claimed to be a government agent who worked alongside Alpha Flight, but was a maverick. Aurora said she was too, now feeling a certain fascination and elation at having found someone like her.
Logan said he would leave the team, because he never saw himself following rules, but he said the girl could stay with them; maybe they could find a better place for her than that dusty convent.
Aurora asked what the other members of the group were like. Logan couldn’t quite describe them: beast-men and beast-women, mystics, patriotic heroes, a man even smaller than him, and a boy who reminded her a lot of Jeanne—he was Asian, with fair skin and hair as dark as hers, but he had visible mutations, like luminous strands on his head and ears pointed skyward.
Aurora stopped short, her heart racing. As if two stars had aligned.